She Feels Like Home
by jeromevaleska
Summary: Tom feels an irresistible urge to confess his feelings for you, after pining for far too long. Tom's POV.
Tonight's the night. The night where I will finally put all my fears aside and tell her how I feel about her.

After a couple years of friendship and guilty nights filled with the thought of her, failed attempts at relationships to try to make this helpless infatuation go away. Countless nights at her place and a couple of miserable, unsuccessful love confessions that turned out to be indecipherable mumbling. I finally felt like I was ready to face the long hidden truth.

I had no assurance that she'd accept, but it was becoming unbearable and simply being her friend was increasingly growing more difficult as time passed. Every time she embraced me or brushed her fingers on my skin in some way, it was as if she knew it was a sweet torture. Or when she looks at me with that flirtatious, shy and lopsided smile that makes me come undone with craving and heartache.

I can't help it; my heart speeds up, my lungs ache. I need to get this out and to really, honestly talk to her about the elephant in the room. How we spend practically all our free time together and have for years; how she's my confidant about anything other than matters of romance, how much of myself I've held back out of fear of her leaving; how much she means to me; how much I want her to acknowledge that even without kissing and sex, we are pretty much together. And, if she's willing, how much I would like to kiss her; how much I'd like to see if that would lead to something more.

It was all going to change tonight, because I couldn't wait anymore. I had to tell her.

Evening seemed to dawn on us early that day, the orange of sunset nothing but a distant glimpse before the night pressed around us. The world in this moment decided to give us the smallest of reprieves, one that was well deserved, the air blowing cool breeze over us and the sky clear but for the few bumbling clouds that drifted by. Stars dappled the sheet of black that blanketed the sky above us, like pinholes in fabric, the moon hanging in the sky and spreading its illumination.

The silence between us was punctuated by the coos of birds, each rustle of leaves nothing more than a soft shift, no rumblings or snapping branches large enough to be a menace.

We were settled next to each other, huddling together and leaning on each other for support, using each other's bodies as a sense of direction and reassurance.

I could feel sweat prickling at the back of my neck as I gazed at her; she's beautiful in every sense of the word, so much so that I don't feel worthy to even look at her. But the thing is, she doesn't even realize it, and I want to tell her, with every fiber of my being I want to tell her but the words just won't come out and I always end up swallowing them.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" she said softly, bringing me out of my reverie. Her nose turned up to the sky as her mouth slightly parted in awe, wide eyes drinking in the night. The gleam of the stars etched the soft edges of her face, glinting off her smooth hair and making her irises light up. Her entirety seemed to glow in front of me.

"Yeah," I said, my voice cracking around the word. I cleared my throat as I could feel my cheeks burning.

"We haven't had a clear night like this in a while," she sighed. She leaned back slightly, stretching her face up towards the dotted sky, closing her eyes momentarily as she breathed in the fresh air. I could feel my ears growing hot, my hand inches from her own. My fingers were aching to hold her hand and I nearly reached over to take it in mine but I didn't.

I hadn't the slightest clue on how I should start. Suddenly, I couldn't remember a single word that I had been rehearsing for the past couple of days because she's here before me. Somehow she always knows how to leave me at a loss for words, and she doesn't even have to say anything to do it.

"Did you miss me today?" she asked softly, her lips forming into a playful smile.

"Always," I admitted, she was watching me through her impossibly long, dark lashes in the way that made my heart stutter, making my mouth a little dry, and I had to remind myself to breathe when she reached up and took my hand and laid it palm down on her chest over her heart.

That heartbeat. Sometimes, in the dark when I fell asleep or chose to stay and she ended up with her ear pressed against my chest, it felt like it was the only thing I was living for.

"Good," she said, forcing her voice into smugness, "I missed you too."

There was a deafening silence that hung over us all of a sudden, and I wanted nothing more than to chase it away because it was suffocating, numbing me, until it faded away.

"Hey Tom," she said, almost in a whisper.

My head instantly turned to her direction and I cocked an eyebrow at her, "Yeah?"

"How do you know if you're in love or not?" she asked.

It seemed like an innocuous enough question. Harmless, really. But not when it was coming for her, no, I didn't have the slightest clue on how to even answer that.

"Where is this coming from?" I asked, even though I knew how foolish it was of me to respond with another question but I didn't know where she was going with this, and I could feel my whole body tingling as I waited for her answer.

"I'm just... well, I'm curious, that's all," she turned to look at me before she repeated the question, "how do you know if you're in love?"

There was a somewhat playful tone to her voice, I felt like she just wanted to hear my response more than actually trying to seek an answer to her question.

"I don't really know," I finally answered after a long moment of staring up into one of the trees, as though the leaves could possibly hold the answer. "I think you're just supposed to know."

She turned to me with a lingering look in her eyes, then she glanced down at my lips, and I could tell that she didn't mean for me to notice when she instantly averted her gaze when I caught her.

"Yeah, probably," she whispered with a slight curve of her lip. This time I examined every motion of her face, every crease at the corners of her eyes, the way her hair flowed in the light breeze of the air, how her expression tended to change when she was trapped in a reverie of possibly conflicting thoughts. I just wanted to get in her head, understand her more.

Then what she said next took me completely by surprise, my heart jolted and I didn't think there was any way that I could prepare for it, even if I knew beforehand.

"Suppose you're supposed to know by kissing the other person," she suggested with a light giggle.

"By kissing?" I asked before lifting my head to look at her, even though I already knew the answer. I just wanted to hear her repeat it so I knew this was real.

I found myself caught then, by her beautiful wide eyes that were intense, and so very, very much closer than I thought they would be.

"Yeah," she told me, nodding, her cheeks a light shade of pink, but her face looked neutral. Unreadable. It made my palms sweat and my heart beat harder than it ever had before. There was a long pause, and she was staring at me, and I desperately wanted to know what was going through her head. "I'm just curious, that's all," she repeated and trailed off, voice sounding even quieter than before. She was stuttering. Why was she so nervous? I thought I was the one who was struggling with these feelings the whole time but to know that she as well...

We were really close, so close that we were sharing one another's breath.

"So," I breathed, focusing on her eyes as they locked on me.

Before I got the chance to say anything more, she spoke up, "Please kiss me," she pleaded, her tongue darting out to lick at her lips anxiously. My eyes glanced down to her mouth at the motion of her tongue, my breath hitching. Her words took me by surprise, but I had absolutely no objections.

"Yeah," I nodded my head in agreement, "okay," I murmured, leaning in closer to close the gap.

"Don't be nervous," she whispered. I instantly relaxed, a little, as if her voice was a healing incantation, and forced myself to keep eye contact with her. She always knew how to ease my nerves and comfort me when I needed it. Her eyes held a mesmerizing twinkle I had never seen before, reminding me of a summer sunset shining on the ocean's surface. She squeezed my hand gently before letting it go.

Closing my eyes, I tried not to let fear take over my mind and body. Because this was the moment I had been waiting for, for as long as I could remember.

I tilted my head just a little and then suddenly my lips covered hers, my eyes fluttering shut. When her soft, full lips met mine, I felt like my heart was about to leap out of my chest, with joy, recognition.

I was kissing her.

I was kissing her.

The kiss was shy and tentative at first, but it didn't take long to become more heated and passionate. I placed my hand at the small of her back to bring her closer to my body, one of her hands rested on my chest while the other held my shoulder. With every brush of her lips, I felt less and less conscious of the world around me, each and every one of my senses focused on her and her alone. I could taste the tea she had been drinking hours before, it mixed with an intoxicating flavor that was all her own. When she headily breathed my name against her lips, I felt like I was soaring through the clouds as she confirmed what I had been hoping was true, that the feelings I had for her weren't one-sided.

Feeling her tongue tease along my lower lip, I readily opened my mouth to let her explore. As our tongues danced together, my head spun with desire and I had an overwhelming yearning to slip my hands under her dress to caress her gentle, flawless skin. I could feel my toes curl as I pressed closer to her, losing myself in her scent, the soft, quiet giggles she emitted, her everything.

It was a sensation similar to coming up from underwater, of wool being pulled from over my head. Everything that had felt so far away and dreamlike suddenly became tangible. My senses sharpened, came alive. I found myself leaning into her warm hands as I kissed her. I tried to protest when the kiss ended, attempted to follow those sweet lips, but the only thing I could was sigh. My body was slow, my brain foggy as the butterflies rushed to the pit of my stomach, fluttering.

After a moment, breathless and slightly dazed from the kiss, chest heaving a little, cheeks flushed, almost perfectly in sync. I finally spoke, "Y/N?"

I swallowed, closing my eyes as though trying to gather myself.

"Yes?" she breathed, leaning back in to press our foreheads together, we couldn't have been closer. She focused her whole attention on me so I knew that it had to be perfect, I couldn't mess this up, I had to tell her what I had been planning to, at last.

"I love you," I whispered against her parted lips. She didn't give me a chance to finish though because before I could, she threw her arms around my neck, pulling me down to meet her lips in another heated kiss. I cupped her face in my hands and kissed her back with as much passion as I could muster, and I could feel hot tears streaming down her cheeks in the midst of it. When we broke for air, we didn't pull away from each other completely, and her warm breath was still hitting my lips as I looked into her misty eyes, she was smiling through all the tears.

"In love with me," she echoed it, her voice nearly cracking before she finished, "I feel the same way," she said softly, "I always have. You're the first person I've ever felt like this about..."

"Why didn't you say anything before?" I asked, even though I knew it was a stupid question, though I was still shocked from the kiss and every look and every word that had cane out of her mouth. I carefully wiped away her tears with the pad of my thumb. "Hey, hey, don't cry," I told her.

"Because you're my best friend, seeing you every day is my favorite thing," she took a breath before she added, "I got scared that things would be different if I said something, I didn't want to mess this up," she confessed, blinking back her tears in an effort to stop them. My heart swelled for her when I heard those words. It was actually a relief knowing that I wasn't the only one sweating and feeling conflicted over the exact same thing.

"You don't have to be scared of losing me, because I'm not going anywhere, okay? I'm always here for you," I tried to reassure her as I held her face in my hands gently as I kissed the tears away.

"You're always there to listen to me, when I needed comfort, when I needed a friend, whenever I needed more," she said in a soft murmur, "you're always there."

"And I'll always be there," I said as I pressed my forehead against hers once more. "Because I love you, so so dearly."

I placed a soft kiss upon the tip of her nose as I pulled her closer to me and it was like the whole world disappeared around us for a while and all we could see was each other and the stars above us.

She smiled and heaved a sigh of relief as she intertwined her fingers with mine, and I kissed the back of her hand. Here with her, I was happy, whole, and content. Here was home and so was she, and it didn't matter if neither of us could find or figure out the right words to say. We had our own language, connected by heartbeats and heart-lines and hands, written in a thousand little ways. She made the final move, slowly bringing her head down to lie it upon my shoulder as we watched the stars, and with that I feel like I could conquer anything. Bound through the longest expanse of emptiness the universe had to offer me - I had already done so now - as long as I could stay like this, the smell of her hair in my nose and the warmth of her body snug in my arms. I could do anything.

And it's all that mattered.


End file.
